Smorgasbord...

This is it.  

The last of my catch up.

Until I get way behind again.

My life is too awesome, I have too many cool things to put up here.  Be jealous.

First: Stanford Football started up again.  We get a family pass every year and go to almost every single home game.  It is has been a fun family activity for many years now.

  

Second: Adell is in preschool.  I signed her up--and told her I was sending her to preschool--in June.  All summer long she cried, "I don't want to go to preschool.  If you take me to preschool will you stay with me the whole time?"  Some time in the spring Adell started having some heavy separation anxiety issues.  Where previously she would skip up to her friends front door, happy for a play date--she would start crying as we pulled into their driveways and beg me to stay.  Even with family, if I left for an evening out or dropped her off at her cousin's house she would cry.  It was heart breaking.  So, I expected the worst once preschool rolled around.  However, whatever separation anxiety she had in the spring and summer was gone by September.  She loves, loves, LOVES preschool.  She loves her teacher, Miss Carrie.  She loves Miss Carrie's house, she loves Miss Carrie's classroom, she loves her classmates.  I am so happy!  One day Miss Carrie took the kids out into her garden and they picked vegetables.  Adell helped me cut all the veggies for a super yummy lunch.  

Third:  I got one year older.  The kids gave me a special date with Will.  My friends threw me a little lunch party in the park...where Colter spread cupcake frosting all over me.  It was a wonderful birthday.

  

Fourth: We moved rooms and children around.  When we moved into this house we only had four children.  Clare and Adell shared a room, Lorien and Wyatt each had their own rooms.  Then we had another baby...but instead of moving the baby in with Wyatt right away we put the baby in a half bath.  (Who needs two and a 1/2 bathrooms--not us?)  The crib fit perfectly.  However, one day instead of taking his nap, Colter climbed out of his crib and onto the bathroom counter behind the crib.  I was horrified thinking about all the harm that could have come to him.  That very day we started moving kids and rooms.

See, the crib fits really well in this 1/2 bath.  See the baby up on the counter?  He had the water on...see the electrical outlet right next to the baby?  Shudder...

Now we have Colter and Wyatt in Lorien's old room.  Clare gets to have a turn having her own room in Wyatt's old room.  Lorien and Adell are in Clare and Adell's old room.  It has worked out just fine.  Sometimes the older kids are frustrated with having to share with the youngest kids but what are they going to do?  Most of the time all is well.  Adell likes to have sleepovers in Lorien's bunk and Wyatt is generous with his room space.

  

Fifth: the flue made it's way through out family in the third week of school.  Colter got it first, then Adell, then Clare and Wyatt, Lorien and I were the last ones to have it...Will escaped.

Sixth: the middle school had it's first dance.  I didn't want Lorien to go.  I convinced her to have her friends over for a movie night instead.  This is what it looks like when four 11 year olds hang out together.

Lots of interpersonal connections being made...lots.

They did put the screens down once Will got the ice cream bar set up...

Seventh: every other week I make Lorien sit still so I can blow dry and flat iron her hair.  The first time it took me a little over an hour.  The second time about 50 minutes.  I am down to 45 minutes now--I don't think I can shave any more time off with out shaving some of Lorien's hair off first.

I deserve a medal for patience.

     

Eighth: Grandma Claudia sent Adell a few packages of seeds this summer.  She planted them and patiently watched for plants to grow.  Here she is, proudly showing off the bean plants.

Ninth: Colter is so much stinkin' trouble.  I think I could put a post up a day with the troublesome things he does.  I cannot keep up.  He is getting bigger, smarter and better control of his physical self.  He knows how to pull a kitchen stool up to the table or kitchen drawers to wreak havoc.  

He is always exceedingly pleased with his accomplishments.  Rascal.  

Tenth: we have 100 thousand miles on our van.  We bought our van used and it only had 16 thousand miles on it.  Keep driving van!  The van ticked over to 100,000 while I was driving home from Wyatt's first soccer game of the season.

I was at a traffic light when I took this picture.  

That is it...ten things that have happened in the late summer early fall over here.  Congratulations on making it to the end of this post.  Now pay the toll and leave a comment.

Good bye sweet summer! Hello hectic fall!

Holy-Guacamole!  It is September 15th!  I haven't been keeping up the old family blog at all.  And not because I don't want to--it has just been one fun-filled-action-packed day after another around here.  Our summer was perfect, I'll have to back date some blog post to catch myself up.  We went to Montana and filled our days at home with projects and friends.  It was lovely.

Then school started.

Every day has been crazy busy.  I cannot understand how we cram so much into one weekday.  We are working on finding the rhythm of our days...packing lunches, homework, chores, soccer, cross country and instrument practice are all finding their place.

It will be nice to take some time and remember the slow days of summer.

Go forth and conquer...

Yay for school!

Worth every penny...

Remember this?

Lorien got a major hair cut right before school got out.  She loved it for about a week.  Then...she told me (through tears) that one of her friends showed her a text another "friend" had sent saying "Lorien's new hair cut = ugly".

You can imagine my reaction.  I started trying to figure out how to leave a horses head in that "friend's" bed the next morning.

I never managed to pull that plan off.

The problem is, Lorien has crazy, thick hair.  The short cut made all that thick hair stick out like she had stuck her finger in an electrical socket.  She can keep it clean--but keeping it tamed is another matter.

Instead of lashing out at the "friend", Lorien and I made a plan to see my hair dresser.  Maybe a professional would find a way to make her feel better about her hair again?  My hair dresser said there wasn't a lot she could do right away.  After agreeing that "friend" totally deserved to wake up to a severed horses head, she suggested letting Lorien's hair grow for the summer and trying a fix right before school started.

So, I took Lorien to my hair dresser today.  That sweet woman spent thirty minutes trimming Lorien's hair...then she spent 90 minutes blow drying and flat ironing Lorien's hair.  The transformation was amazing.

This is the best "before" picture I have...

So pretty!  Her hair looks nice too.

She has been confident smiles all day.  School starts tomorrow...I hope that "friend" falls in the mud on the way to school.  Do I need to grow up?

My tana...

We made our way back to Montana this summer.  If you remember, last summer was our first trip back to Will's home-state in five years.  While we were talking about summer plans earlier in the season Will confessed, he missed home and wanted to get the kids back up to the lake.  I was happy to go--as long as he did all the planning and prep work.  Packing the car was my only contribution to the trip.

Like last year, Will drove out with the big kids and I flew out with Colter.

Like last year, as soon as Will and the kids were gone I started having panic attacks.  This is a strange thing about me.  I need some help figuring out the root of these panic attacks.  I have a book called When Panic Attacks...but I only read it through eyes blurred with tears as my panic is attacking.  It hasn't proven to be super helpful.  I mostly avoid the house when I am in the throws of these attacks.  Being in the almost empty house seems to be the biggest trigger.  Saturday was the worst, I finally came home after forcing my baby to be out all day.  As soon as the door closed behind me I started to shake.  I couldn't breathe...I couldn't see...it was crazy...I was crazy.  I put Colter safely in his high chair and grabbed the phone.  It was a toss up, call 911 or my sister.  My sister won.  Through gasps and sobs I told her that I was physically fine but mentally off my rocker.  

It was horrible.

My sister was saintly.  She talked me through my emotions.  She talked me through feeding the baby.  I was so consumed by panic I couldn't remember how to feed him--or myself.  She shared personal experiences from her own life and her own work through anxiety.  I called the right person.  

Yuck, that is one unpleasant start to a post about a pretty awesome trip.  Sorry.

Once Colter and I were in Montana everything was A-OK.  We took the grand tour of the lake front.  The kids showed us their sand castles, our tent, the cabin--everything.  The whole family was happy to be back together again.

We spent about five days at the lake.  Of course, Will is never really on vacation...work had to be done.  Will's younger brother, Alan, also works with Will--so he had to work too.  This is what work looks like at the lake:

There is other "work" to be done at the lake too.  Sand castles must be built.  Marshmallows must be roasted.  Children and adults must water ski.  

It is very stressful...

Much of the real work at the lake involves the boat.  Even the kids have to pitch in with the work.

Somebody get that girl a cheese burger.  If she has to turn that steering wheel her arms will snap off...

Wyatt proved to be the best water skier in our family.  He crossed the wake and was a natural out there.

Lorien hated water skiing.  But like many things in her life, her parents made her do it because it builds character.  She would like to take a wrecking ball to character.

There was plenty of cousin-bonding going on.  Clare and Andrew were attached at the hip.  Here they are in a fort they made in the woods.

A couple of Hobbits, running barefoot through the forest...drinking soda.

Most of the kids preferred to be pulled behind the boat on the tube over skiing.

Will and Alan had a baby fight.  Will won.

More fun on the "beach".

Clare was nervous the first time she got up on skis.  But it didn't take long before she was skiing like a pro.  She even let go of the handle a couple of times to wave.  Woot-woot!

Even Adell got up on water skis.  Sort of.

She kept her little body crouched down on the skis creating a spray of water--up into her face.  Still, she went all the way around the bay--getting her face sprayed with lake water.

And...on the last day...I went water skiing too.  I am not a water skier.  I am not a down-hill skier.  I am a cross country skier--in that I went cross country skiing four or five times one winter in middle school as part of a PE unit.  I am wicked good at cross country skiing.  Water skiing...not so much.  Alas, I couldn't properly expound on all the character building benefits of water skiing to Lorien without going once myself.

So, Will and I got behind the boat and off we went.  I got up just fine and assumed my "natural" water skiing position...which is almost exactly like Adell's.  I hunch over, bend my knees and cry.  Then I fell over and got water up my nose.

It wasn't a bad fall so we tried again.  I love tempting fate.  This time, as the boat turned around one part of the bay I started to cross the wake, lost my cool and fell over.  I fell backwards this time and my body was going faster than I anticipated.  My legs (still solidly attached to water skis) shot out in front of me and my back-side skidded along the top of the water.  The result: an atomic wedgie that would have made any middle-school-80's-movie-bully proud.  My bathing suit actually became part of my body for a few seconds...the fish way down in the deeps of the lake were treated to a view of my blinding white hiney as I skipped across the lake.

It was awesome.

I came up from the fall in pain.  I couldn't walk or sit down for a couple of days.  I will probably never water ski again.  Who needs character?

Photographic proof of my water skiing.  That's me on the left...no, I'm on the right.  Yes, that's me on the right--hard to tell when you have the same hair cut as your husband...

Then, after Will and I skied.  Alan and his wife got up on the skis.  They held hands.

Then they kissed.  Then I cut their ropes and told the driver of the boat to leave them in the lake because I hated them.  The driver ignored me.

There was another reason we went out to Montana this summer.  Will's youngest sister, Emily, was getting married to a great guy--Kenny.  So, after a handful of days at the lake we packed up the van and drove down from Montana to Utah for the wedding.

I really loved this drive.  It was fun to do just one part of the three-part road trip Will and the kids did.  We stopped at a few picturesque places and played travel games (I couldn't reach the DVD player...).

At the reception the bride's older brothers gave Kenny an affectionate welcome to the family--affectionate for a family of wrestlers.  They turned Kenny into a Groom-ata (like Pinata--but more Groomy).  Kenny was such a great sport.  We thought it was funny.  Will's mother did not think it was funny--sorry Judy.  My kids liked the Groom-ata but that could have been all the candy talking.

We also managed to squeeze a little visit in with some of my relatives while we were in Utah.  My Dad was out from New Hampshire.  One of my nephews is going on a mission in November (to New Zealand!). It was fun to see my brothers and their families.

My dad is the big guy in the middle.  See any family resemblance?  

At long last, it was time to go home.  Colter and I flew home while Will and the kids drove across the long, dry, boring roadscape that is Nevada.  (I am such a lucky girl.)  I even got to fly with my brother-in-law.  So I had help with Colter.

What a trip!